Kavanaugh vote brings political theater to downtown

Before the votes were counted for Saturday’s confirmation of the Supreme Court’s newest justice, dozens of women — and a few men — hit downtown Fort Lauderdale streets to protest.

They were led by a handful of silent women clad in scarlet robes and white bonnets, heads bowed and hands clasped, to evoke the dystopian future imagined in the “The Handmaid’s Tale.” The novel, and the subsequent movies, consider how the country might become a totalitarian society ruled by a fundamentalist regime that treats women as property.

“We must act so that we can tell our daughters that we did everything we could to make sure you have a better future,” said Ingrid Ayala, 45, of Deerfield Beach. “We have to break this system.”

It wasn’t just that Justice Brett Kavanaugh could be the deciding vote to overturn the 1973 landmark abortion ruling, Roe v. Wade. Or that his confirmation hearing included the accusation by one woman that he sexually assaulted her during a teenage party in the 1980s, organizers said.

“The allegations are truly horrible and the Republicans are so dismissive,” said Rosa Valderrama, vice chair of the Pro-Choice Coalition of Broward County, which organized the event. “Ten old men who are Republican … They are going to get voted out.”

The sounds of “Vote them out,” and other calls and responses bounced off the concrete canyons of downtown Fort Lauderdale, as the protesters walked through the Himmarshee District onto Las Olas. Sidewalk diners got out their phones to take videos of the spectacle and others plugged their fingers into their ears.

But some nearby started chanting “Trump, Trump” while others gave marchers the thumbs-down.

JENNIFER LETT/SUN SENTINEL Saturday’s march in Fort Lauderdale was among the protests nationwide to demand that the U.S. Senate reject Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court, but he was confirmed and sworn in.